The nightingale's voice
by MonumentForTheDead
Summary: A piano lesson set in a normal afternoon, when Cinderella discovers she likes her stepmother more than she would admit... (This summary sucks, I know...)


**Another fic about Cinderella and Lady Tremaine! I received more reviews than I thought I would get with my other fic, so I decided to write another one... (Don't expect nothing graphip or more than a sligh physical contact between them. Pair Cinderella with her stepmother is more difficult than it seems)**

**Another thing: this one-shot contains some violence. I don't like Cinderella very much, and I always like to make her suffer a bit in my fics hahahaha**

**There's a line in this story that I made and I loved it. If you guys read it with Eleanor Audley's voice it gets even more sarcastic and mean! (I kept reading that line over and over again, just thinking "how could I come up with something so delightfully sarcastic? omg" hahahaha) I guess I'll highlight the line in the text... :)**

**So, I think that's it! Enjoy!**

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Another long, exhausting day of work... I was pretty used after all…

I was just finishing cleaning the rugs from the upper level of the house, when I passed across the music room. Someone was singing, and it was surely not one of my spiteful step-sisters…

"_Sing sweet nightingale… sing sweet nightingale, high above me…"_

That voice was so melodic, though so low I almost didn't hear it… I couldn't even imagine who was singing like that. It couldn't be Anastasia, or Drizella, unless some kind of miracle happened to their voices… Well, that was a weird possibility of… But that wasn't possible…

Stepmother?

She never sang before… Well, not that I ever heard her… It was just not like her to sing in her free time. I've already had heard her play the piano, which, by the way she played beautifully, but she never sang.

The door wasn't completely closed, so I could peep a little inside the room. It was really her, sat at the piano, her hands running across the instrument absentmindedly, her eyelids almost closed. She stopped singing, now she was just humming the melody of the song.

I knew I shouldn't interrupt that, but I was never really clever, and never really thought about consequences, so I pushed the door open slowly, and entered the room. Why? I didn't really know… Maybe I just wanted to hear her more clearly…

It never crossed my mind that she would never sing to me…

Especially if I caught her by surprise, completely vulnerable, when I should be doing my chores, not getting myself in each other's business…

The next thing I heard was a huge slam at the piano, the notes coming brutally from it. She got up from the chair, in shock.

"_Cinderella! What in heaven's name are you doing here?"_ Her voice seemed nothing like the one that was singing mere moments ago. The old Lady Tremaine was back, with her inquisitive eyebrows and the superiority look on her face, and worst; with her harsh voice, cold like ice. The voice that I heard everyday in the morning, the voice that used to reprehend me, the voice that I feared more than anything…

_I'm… I'm sorry, stepmother, I was just…"_ How I hated to stutter in front of her. I never stuttered with anyone in the house, but with her, the words simply wouldn't come out of my mouth properly.

"_Was just… Was just what? Spit it out!" _She sounded more scared than usual… Well, I wouldn't say scared, but maybe a little… Worried? Ashamed of being caught in such a particular moment? I wouldn't know, but I instantly regretted interrupting her, as she came towards me, looking terribly threatening.

"_I was just passing across the room… And…"_ Suddenly I imagined the perfect lie. She maybe even falls into that!

"_And…?"_ She asked. Her right hand trembling beside her body, surely ready to slap me across the face.

"_And I remembered that I didn't clean up this room, so I entered to clean it"_ I said, unconsciously sighing with relief. Please, let her believe that…

She stopped for a moment, considering if she should believe me or not. Her cold green eyes scanning me head to toe.

*****"_And how could you clean up the room without even a broom? I guess you would clean off the dust from the furniture with your_ tongue?"*****She gave a cruel smirk. Her eyes still cold when she lifted the hand that was so willing to hurt me.

I shrank in fear as I tried to get away from her hand, but she was way too quicker than me, so she grabbed the first thing she could before I could escape, which was a handful of my hair, from the left side of my head.

"_What were you doing, you little brat?"_ She applied more pressure on her hand, almost taking off my hair. I couldn't hold a whine of pain, when she shook me brutally. _"Answer me!"_

"_I was just passing by, I swear! I had done all my chores, and I heard you singing…"_ My eyes were almost welling up, but I fought against the tears.

"_And why you didn't get back to your bedroom if you finished all your chores? Why were you wandering across the house?" _She seemed not to want to talk about the singing. She avoided it like I would avoid her contact at every cost, if even I could get away from her grip.

"_I wanted to…"_ My slow little brain couldn't think of any other lies, especially under the fear I was being submitted to, so I decided to tell her the true.

"_I wanted to go to the village…"_

Her eyes widened a little bit, and in her surprise she took down a bit of the strength in her hold, but she still didn't let me go.

"_Go to the village? For what purpose?"_ Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion, and in her momentarily mercifulness, I took the opportunity to grab her right hand, not daring to push her away, but just to make her aware that her contact was hurting me.

"_I wanted to get some fresh air, stroll along… Please, let me go"_ I was honestly fearing for my life now. She had a furious look in her eyes, and if I got out from that alive, I would promise to her to never leave the house in my life, only leaving my bedroom when strictly necessary…

"_You know the rules, Cinderella. You aren't allowed to leave without my permission"_

Of course I knew the rules, but it was easier if she admitted to herself that her daughters had no talents in anything, than giving me a permission to get out of the house. I cursed myself mentally, for being so curious. If I just passed across the music room, without thinking twice about who was singing, I'd be already on the village, strolling along the streets and talking to people that would be nice to me for a change. But no, I had to be so damn curious!

"_You know I'll have to punish you for this… Which is terrible, you know how I hate to see my precious stepdaughter suffer"_ She said with a clear note of sarcasm in her voice. She couldn't even suppress a grin.

But despite everything she does with me, I can't hate her… I always find a way to forgive her for all the terrible things she says and does to me... I can even find myself capable of liking her sometimes, for example, when I saw her singing peacefully moments before snapping into the old Lady Tremaine I already know so well. I liked her in that moment… Or when she told me to help her get dressed in the morning a few weeks ago, she thanked me after it, and I liked her for that… I couldn't help but wonder: Am I too silly and innocent, or she does have a side that I don't know yet?

"_Yes, stepmother…"_ I waited for my punishment quietly. She had finally released me, and now she turned towards a little cabinet in one corner of the room, where she pulled a thin, long wood stick from the top drawer. I shivered. It wasn't the first time she had beaten me with that, and I didn't want to repeat the experience ever again.

"_Sit by the piano"_ She demanded with a hard voice

What she wanted me to do now? Play? I've never played a piano in my life, in fact I've never even touched one, even when my father was alive. I always preferred to sing instead of play, but now, my stepmother was telling me to sit by the piano, and I was pretty sure of what was coming for me if I didn't played, so I sat uneasily, looking straight at the ivory and black keys.

"_Play 'Sing Sweet Nightingale'"_ She said a little softer, but I was still afraid. She rummaged her long fingers through the wooden stick, anxious for me to do some mistake.

"_I'm sorry stepmother, but I don't know how…"_

***SLAP***

She hit my hands hard with the stick, and I had to suppress a scream of pain and surprise. My eyes met hers in a desperate plea. If she continued to hit me if I didn't played anything, I would end the afternoon without my hands.

"_I guess you'll have to learn then…"_

And with a gracious move, she sat by my side, took my aching hands into hers, and led me to the right keys.

"_Learn the correct order now"_ She directed my hands to a sequence, and we played the song together once. By the end, I was feeling very… Distant, drown in my own thoughts…

A few weeks ago I learned that my stepmother was the perfect model of a woman who ages with grace, keeping her figure and her class. I realized when I helped her to get dressed, that she had the smoothest skin I could only dream to have, and her hands weren't an exception. I always though that her silky skin came with the fact that she rarely did housework – if she ever done that in her life – by the other hand, my skin felt more and more like wood as the days passed by. How I wish I could be just like her, or her daughters! In fact, I always wondered why she never hired a proper maid to look after the house…

"_Did you get the sequence, Cinderella?" _She asked, letting go of my hands _"Cinderella! Answer me!"_

She yelled close to me, her voice breaking suddenly into my trance. I turned my face quickly from the keys, and I saw her green eyes, very, _very_ close to my face, staring almost inside of me. I was certain she could see my thoughts now, even if I struggled to conceal them.

"_Yes, stepmother, I did…"_ that was the first thing I could think of to say, although I seriously doubted she believed in me.

"_Then play…"_ She got up from the stool again, holding that horrible stick on her hands, waiting for me.

I played.

Or at least I tried to make some decent sounds out of that… The next thing I felt was the stick, hitting my hands again, this time harder than before. I screamed, without being able to hold the pain.

"_Again, Cinderella"_ She said tiredly, although I could get a glimpse of a smirk in her lips.

We kept on this for, maybe the entire afternoon. The pain of getting hit by that thing wasn't so strong now, my skin had grown accustomed to the feel, and by the tenth time I tried to play, the sequence was right, and all the notes came harmoniously. Of course I protested a few times, when she would slap me, not in the back of the hands, but in the joint of the fingers – that hurt more than anything I've ever experienced before – but then she would give me a look that warned that if didn't behaved, I could get worst than that.

Finally, by the end of the afternoon, I was playing "Sing Sweet Nightingale" with my eyes closed. She sat beside me again and demanded me to play again, I played, and she followed me pressing other keys, which made the sound much richer and beautiful.

"_Sing sweet nightingale, sing sweet nightingale…"_ I started to sing absentmindedly. Then I remembered that was Lady Tremaine sat beside me, so I looked at her, worriedly, afraid she would scorn me and yell for me to be quiet, but she made something I wasn't expecting.

"…_High above me"_

She continued the song with the voice I heard before. The voice I heard when I was trying to slip away from the chateau for a little bit of fresh air. The voice that was so calm and clear, so melodic and sweet, that made me close my eyes. All I wanted was to play for her, to hear her voice until the song was over. And then I'd play again, and again… As long as she kept singing.

"_Very well, child"_ She said almost lovingly after the music was over. _"Now, let's see those hands…"_

She took my sore hands into hers and caressed the reddened skin carefully. It wasn't like her to do that; usually she would hit me and leave, not caring about if I was going to be okay. I could be even bleeding, she wouldn't care about it.

"_That's what happens when you don't learn quickly"_ Her voice was calm, different from the cold, hard tone she used to say this sentence.

"_Yes stepmother, I'm sorry for trying to sneak out"_

"_I hope this never happens again"_

"_It won't"_

"_Good. Now, off you go"_

But before I could get up from the stool, she reached a hand towards my face and ran her long fingers through my cheek, her eyes staring intently into mine. After that, I couldn't help but give her a little smile, which she returned politely, before letting me go.

After I got out from the room, I kept wondering for some long moments why I didn't even bother to protest and run away anytime I wanted while she tortured me and hit me with that stick. I could have done that… She's can't be stronger than me, I think… Why did I take everything like I deserved? Why did I accept her orders and aggression so easily?

Maybe because she bosses me even since I was a little kid, and I had grown accustomed to that, maybe because I feared her more than everything in the world…

But I also liked her…

And now – that was undeniable – I realized I like her more that I thought, and maybe I like to be hit and harassed by her. I learned to like her aggression, if that was possible…

And I wanted more of that than I could ever imagine…

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**Cinderella decides she's a little masochist... LOL **

**Don't blame me guys, I wanted to make something like that because I'm a little bit into SxM too... It all started when I asked a girl to pull my hair, and she did. I liked that so much that I asked her to do that again and she just looked at me like: "are you kidding me?" HAHAHAHAHA **

**Also, when I finished this, it reminded me of 50 shade's of grey, (I hate that shit, just so you know), don't kill me guys! I just like to make Lady Tremaine a dominant bitch over Cinderella! It's not my fault it's almost written in Cinderella's face that she takes everything because she enjoys it! hahaha**

**Anyway, feel free to murder me by dropping a little review! Thanks!**


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